The Peterborough Evening Telegraph
38 jobs lost as boiler firm is forced to close
Impragas was formerly owned by Apprentice star
A plumbing business in Peterborough - formerly owned by TV Apprentice winner Joseph Valente - has closed with the loss of 38 jobs.
ImpraGas, based in Southgate Way, Orton Southgate, has shut seven months after being bought by turnaround specialist Andy Scott, founder of REL Capital.
Mr Scott blamed the Covid pandemic as the most recent reason for the company’s closure.
He said: “Coupled with having to close down for Covid, because people were not letting anyone into their homes other than for emergencies, and our core business was boiler upgrades and so not urgent, there was no way we could carry on.
“We kept all the staff furloughed for as long as possible but had to make them redundant last week.”
After buying the ImpraGas name and assets for an undisclosed sum, Mr Scott vowed to invest £200,000 in the company and moved it from its previous base in Falcon Way, Yaxley, to Orton Southgate.
At the time Mr Scott warned: “We have taken it on and have saved jobs and we hope to make a go of it.
“The first three months of a turn around are quite scary because you’re pumping money in and you have to watch the numbers like a hawk.”
Announcing the closure, he said there had also been some issues relating to the previous ownership.
He said: “I shall have to put this one down to a very expensive mistake. The closure is sad.”
Mr Scott bought the ImpraGas brand and assets from the 2015 BBC The Apprentice winner Joseph Valente, of Peterborough.
Mr Valente had built up ImpraGas from scratch in 2012 and at the time of the sale the company was reported as having 70 staff and with a turnover of £10 million and with monthly sales hitting £1 million a month.
According to documents at Companies House, at the same time as the sale of ImpraGas, assets of £2,000 along with £1,953,721.44 owing to 34 creditors became the responsibility of VBH Assets, another company owned by Mr. Valente, and which went into liquidation in February this year.
Mr Valente said: “Mr Scott carried out more than due diligence on the business and really had a blank canvas on which to work.
He said: “VBH Assets went into liquidation. There is no debt.”
Mr Valente, who published his account of his time with Lord Sugar in his autobiography, Expelled from the Classroom to Billionaire Boardroom, is currently running his mentoring business for the construction industry called Trade Mastermind and Coaching Academy.